Preussen Clipper

[exwafoo]

Many years ago, in a Boy's Own Annual (now showing my age) there was a plan to build a model tugboat. Portholes (or scuttles as they were/are referred to in the RN) were modeled by pushing a light blue plastic knitting needle up a suitable sized brass tube, sawing and sanding slices and then gluing on. For some reason this method has stuck in a corner of my memory. A bit big for what we do, however I have used pieces of small diameter, small bore brass tube, polished at one end, then filled with white plasticene sunk into the, usually, a deck house. Works quite well.

 

Al

[Chasseur]

@ Al,

however I have used pieces of small diameter, small bore brass tube, polished at one end, then filled with white Plasticine sunk into the, usually, a deck house. Works quite well.

 

The aforementioned is a method I have not heard about.

 

I like it.

 

I will definitely check into it and do you have any pictures to show it .... please advise ... Jeff

Edited February 9, 2016 by Chasseur

[Shipbuilder]

Beyond my comprehension at the moment        I printed a plan out at 1:857, and the five royal yards came out finer than the whiskers on a cat!   The rigging will need to be as thin as human hair!     The best porthole I could do at that scale would be sticking a needle in and leaving it at that!

Bob

[Chasseur]

Yeah as SIB modelers sometimes we have to compromise a bit when it comes to small scale. I believe the carbon fiber for the royals is 0.5 mm in diameter and the fly tie thread I'll be be using is about 0.003" can't remember I'll have to check ...  however it's close enough for me. 

[exwafoo]

I'll try and get a better close up in daylight, the brigantine is undergoing a refit at present after a shipwreck on launch. Its not to any set scale, but the hull is about 3 inches long.

 

 

The portholes on the sides of the deckhouse are approx 1.5 mm and the one on the door is approx 1mm. The plasticene is white and just smoothed flush with a finger.

 

I have tube of 0.5 mm dia, so could go smaller if required, but the scales quoted above may be beyond it.

 

Al

[Chasseur]

Good pictures Al.

The port holes look very convincing. A touch of blue paint to show reflection of the sky and seas and they would be absolutely perfect IMHO.

*Thanks for posting ... greatly appreciated my friend*

This gives me some sence of what can be achieved and a technique I wasn't aware of!

Jeff

[Chasseur]

@ Bob,

The 8/0 UNI Thread thread mic's out at 0.002" or in your words... finer than Cat Wiskers!

The aforementioned description is pretty accurate on your part ... Jeff

[Chasseur]

I had a chance to work up the stern and fix a rudder to it today!

 

 

 

Fiddly work at this scale to say the least ... Jeff

[ARUP]

Steady as she goes! Nice work!

[Gwyl Blaser]

Nice work Jeff.  The rudder looks very scale.

 

Gwyl

[Shipbuilder]

With waterline models, it is as well to remember that most of the rudder is under water, and the bit above water is almost hidden by the overhanging counter!     See my Preussen model above.     

Bob

[Chasseur]

I had a chance this morning to get into the Man Cave and work on the forecastle area where there are 5 portholes. In behind this area there are crew quarters on the original ship. This piece will be glued onto the upper hull piece after all of the detail work is completed. On top of this piece goes some decking, hand railing, anchors, bollards etc.

 

I had to make a special little tool to hold the small pieces of brass tubing to file up and install. It worked well and I achieved a fairly accurate scale look.

 

First picture shows a template loosely glued on so I could prick pinch the locations on where to drill. Pretty fussy work at this scale and caffeine intake has to be watched during this process.

 

 

Second picture shows ten pieces cut from the tubing with my handy dandy tubing cutter!

 

 

Third and fourth pictures show my little tool I made and a piece of brass tubing being filed and ready to install.

 

 

 

Fifth and sixth pictures show the port holes installed and finished with one coat of flat black for starters. The #11 scalpel blade shows the scale dimension I am working at ... Jeff

 

 

 

[Shipbuilder]

In order to grasp the complex enormity of the task, I printed my sail plan of the Preussen out at the scale the model is being built to, about 71 feet to the inch.        This is obviously going to be the work of a number of years, and still remains beyond my comprehension.     The brass-rimmed portholes are tiny, (and excellent) and certainly beyond my capabilities.   I am watching with great interest, but working at such a scale for me, is just a dream.    A couple of months on a model is pushing my patience to the limit!

Bob

Edited February 28, 2016 by Shipbuilder

[Shipbuilder]

Any more movement on the Preussen?

Bob

[Chasseur]

Unforetunatley none at the moment. The last 2 month's has been spent getting the wife's parents into a nursing home. I have a week off at the end of this month so I have to finish an article for Lone Warrior and hopefully a couple of days can be dedicated to the clipper. Also I will be writing a short tribute article to honour Mr. Donald Hubbard. As you are aware SIBAA is no more!

Jeff

[Chasseur]

Life has a way of getting in between work and hobbies.  The last year and most of this year to date has been trying for our family as we watched my Father in Law go from an old folk’s home to a cane, to a walker, to a nursing home and wheel chair. He has been diagnosed with Parkinson's and is basically bed ridden.

The aforementioned has been a huge stress on all of us… especially my wife. BTW the Mother in Law has Alzheimer's disease. A man can count his blessings each day as he wakes and enjoys life with good health. Zero work has been done with regard to the Preussen as we have had to deal with hospitals, doctors, nurses, healthcare workers et al.

Between works, writing an article for Lone Warrior and working with my son on his 1973 Chevy SS Nova I do manage to get some hobby done here and there. I thought I would share this tool I built for making ratlines.

Inspiration for this tool came from The Bottle Shipwright 1989 No. 1 Vol. 7, Page 12 ... Journal of the Ships in Bottles Association of America (SIBAA). Author: Hans de Haan Holland.

 

This tool was made to complete HMS Lady Prevost and USS Ariel (1:300 scale.) models for the L.W. article. I plan to eventually use the tool for making the ratlines for the Preussen as well and will use Ralph Preston's technique of installation with a minor tweak of my own to eliminate 150 strings coming out of the hull and bottle neck ... Story line in the future.

As with every tool I make the unwritten rule is the materials have to be had from within the man cave. I quickly hunted down some brass square tubing, a spring, screws etc. to fabricate this tool. Parameters were... it had to be adjustable for different mast heights, differing scales of model ships, and it had to fit into my fly tying vice for easy work access.

As with any soldering the trick with small parts is holding them down while you tin and solder the joints. My butane mini torch and pencil tip soldering iron came in handy while my adjustable second hand held everything square to the earth.

I chose a small spring to maintain spacing and tension to keep the lines taunt. This picture below shows my first feeble attempt while trying to glue things on a flat surface.  If you look closely you can see that the glue gets bunged up and things got stuck to the first balsa wood jig I made which a nightmare was trying to remove the ratlines once completed. 

Above: Note the miniature Dead-eyes made from paper to scale. Technique here is print them side by side, cut out and fold, then glue to thread.

Next pictures show the new tool I fabricated and the steps to completion and paint. 

Above: You can see how the spring holds adequate tension and spacing and the bottom part is made to depict breadth and spacing of lines. I can even tweak the angle coming off the mast as well. From here all I have to do is cut small threads and glue them on as I climb up the lines. So there you have it a handy little tool to make a pair of ratlines for each individual mast. Hopefully this fall after the son’s car is running and the article is complete for L.W. I'll dive in full force to get some more work done on the Nitrate Clipper. I am chomping at the bit to get at her!

Jeff

 

[Chasseur]

Here are a couple of shots of the almost completed product. Will use these on the 1:300 models for the Lone Warrior project. I am thinking I might try small wire and solder it up on the jig for the Preussen.

Jig works well... Jeff

 

[Shipbuilder]

Wire works well enough for me, but I don't have the problem of having to fold it down and up again.   That would cause it to kink badly, unless you intend to put the completed ratlines in through the bottle after the ship is in and masts pulled up.      But for me, the problems of rigging it inside the bottle would be insurmountable as I just don't have the patience, and probably not the ability either.     I was getting pretty fed up of rigging my relatively large Preussen (25 feet to 1 inch) by the time I finished it!

Bob

[Shipbuilder]

Any movement on the Preussen yet?

Bob

[Chasseur]

Hi Bob,

I will start back on to her over the Christmas holidays. I just finished the article for Lone Warrior and I am just in the process of modifying one of my work benches. What I discovered while building the 1:300 scale models was when working on the very small parts was if either I sneezed or mishandled a part and it fell on the floor I had a hard time finding it.

So right now I am redesigning one of my benches to be more like a jewelers bench with a special sliding drawer to fit up against my belly to catch anything that gets away on me. Will also have a bench pin incorporated for sawing, cutting, filing etc. Also going to make a couple of custom tool holders to keep everything at arms length.

I have 2 weeks off at Christmas and Lord willing I'll get a lot done on her and you'll be able to see some progress again! Thanks for checking in and I hope you and yours are well.

Jeff

[Shipbuilder]

Hi Jeff,

Thanks.     When I make small standard parts, I always make far more than I need, so that if I lose one or two, it doesn't matter!     If something small flicks out of the tweezers, I don't even bother looking.   They usually turn up eventually, and can be put back in stock.     Here are the last lot of tiny ship's wheels that I etched from 2 'thou brass.     I don't have the qualities required to spread the work on a model over years.    I like to get them finished within 50 or 60 hours, but will occasionally go over 100 hours - but not very often.    Even at 50 hours, I am getting tired of them in the final ten hours or so!

Bob

 

[Shipbuilder]

Jeff,

Just seen your workbench set up on Model Ship World.    Couldn't reply on there (banned), but is it a magnificent set up!    I don't have the patience to make anything like that, my workbench is just this simple table, and this is about as tidy as it ever gets!    If I want to use the lathe, I just pick it up, and put it on the table.    Same with all the other things.    The switches on the back, left to right are: desk light, CD player, soldering iron and deck power sockets.     I have them all going through the switchboard, so that I am less likely to leave the soldering iron or anything else plugged when I finish,  as a bright red light comes on under each switch when it is in the "one" position!     Stopwatch is for timing work.    I never listen to music whilst building, but prefer listening to "talking books," that I can download free on Librivox from the public domain collection.

Hope you will put the Preussen build on here soon, as Bottled Shipbuilder is not very active of late, and could do with a boost!

Bob

[Chasseur]

A little work done on the Forecastle/deck area. Got some railings on as well. Fiddly work to say the least ... Jeff

 

[DSiemens]

Very impressive.  It's interesting that you've done it separate.  Will it be put on after the ship goes in the bottle?  

[Chasseur]

Thanks Daniel,

no it will be glued onto the front part of the hull just above the bowsprit before insertion. I made it removable so I could work on it as a separate section. There is more detail to go onto this area, i.e. Port and Starbord running lights, a jib crane, two anchors etc. I'll post some more pictures when done.